Shrewsbury House Estate For Sale – in 1873

J.T. Rawlins’ sketch of the old Shrewsbury House

The heavy tome I carefully carried from the counter in the British Library’s Maps department to one of the reading desks was about A3 size, some 4 inches thick and solidly bound. It contained a set of Victorian sales literature for great houses in the south of England, including Shrewsbury House and Mayfield. The Shrewsbury House set was typical: it included a pastel-coloured lithograph of the house, a hand-drawn fold-out map of the estate and half a dozen pages describing the mansion and its grounds. The descriptive statements were centred on each page and contrived to use as many different fonts and sizes as possible.

I’ve included a full transcript of the Shrewsbury House details at the bottom of this post, though I haven’t attempted to reproduce all the different fonts. In true estate agent style it brings out all the advantages of the area – “The Neighbourhood of Shooter’s Hill is exceedingly picturesque and much admired, and a favourite one for residence” – and the location of the house which:

“Is almost on the summit of the hill, about 350 Feet above the Sea Level and commands a beautiful landscape, exhibiting a great variety of extensive distances, a cheerful luxuriance of sylvan scenery, including on the south the Knockholt range in Kent, on the north and east the hilly parts of Essex and Hertfordshire and the Alexandra Palace and Park; on the South, parts of Sydenham and the Crystal Palace and Windsor Castle; and as a home view, the extensive windings of the noble river Thames with its shipping. From the mansion it is said Seven Counties are visible in clear weather.”

This original Shrewsbury House, built in 1789 by the 16th Earl of Shrewsbury was a substantial property with 15 bedrooms, including those for servants, and extensive grounds including pleasure gardens, stables and buildings for livestock, and a 20ft long vinery.

The picture at the top of the post isn’t taken from the sales particulars, the British Library would have charged £60 for a digital reproduction. It is a scan of a sketch originally published in Greenwood’s 1838 “An Epitome of County History“. The house would have been the same in 1873 though – a photograph in the Shrewsbury Park Estate conservation area appraisal shows that the appearance of the house was unchanged through to 1901. The Epitome of County History also extols the views from Shrewsbury House:

Shrewsbury House, in the Parish of Plumsted, the seat of John Cooper,
Esq. is situated on the north-east edge of Shooter's Hill, and commands pros-
pects unequalled in any other part of the county. The metropolis, the shipping,
the winding course of the Thames to the verge of the horizon, the County of
Essex, and the most interesting parts of Kent, including the populous towns of
Greenwich and Woolwich, are all presented to the eye in a vast panorama from
the leads of this lofty mansion. This was the residence, for a considerable time,
of her late Royal Highness the Princess Charlotte, during her education : and
certainly no situation could have been selected more salubrious, or better adapted
to compose the attention to literary pursuits. In the study there is an immense
globe geographically delineated on the floor, formed, it is said, to familiarise the
science to the mind of the illustrious pupil. The interior of this house is
decorated with many works of art, among which are paintings by Waltean,
Permigiano, De Here, Weenix, Glover, Chamberlain, and others ; some fine
sculpture, &c.

The 1873 sales document doesn’t mention the expected price anywhere, it would be too vulgar to mention money I guess, and I wondered how much the estate sold for. However it’s not clear that the house sold at all in 1873 – dependable Colonel Bagnold lists the owners of Shrewsbury House from 1789 through to its demolition in 1923, and he says that the Rev. John Smallman Masters owned it between 1856 and 1888, though he mortgaged it more than once during 1862-76.

One mystery remains about the old house – what happened to the foundation stone? This stone, according to Colonel Bagnold, is inscribed “CHARLES, XVIth Earl &c., &c., of Shrewsbury laid this stone , July 29th, 1789.”, and was installed in a rockery in Well Hall Pleasaunce. It doesn’t seem to be there now as far as I can see – I wonder if it was moved somewhere, or is buried under the shrubbery? The Colonel thought the stone should be mounted on a plinth on the roundabout in Mereworth Drive, which is close to the site of the old Shrewsbury House – what a good way that would have been to commemorate our local history!

Shrewsbury House

Transcript of the 1873 sales description:

KENT,

ON THE SUMMIT OF SHOOTERS HILL

About 8 1/2 miles by road from London Bridge

__________________________________________________

PARTICULARS, WITH CONDITIONS OF SALE

OF

The Shrewsbury House Estate

A VERY CHOICE AND VALUABLE

FREEHOLD RESIDENTIAL

AND

BUILDING PROPERTY

ON THE CREST OF SHOOTERS HILL

About 350 ft. above the sea level and commanding

Very distant and exceedingly beautiful views of Kent, the River Thames with its shipping, the hilly parts of Essex etc.